As part of the Film
Society of Lincoln Center’s showcase “Mavericks and Outsiders: Positif Celebrates American Cinema,†at
the Walter Reade Theater, Jan. 30 – Feb. 5, I finally had the good fortune to
see a film I had always heard people speak about in mixed tones of confusion,
offense and admiration: Fingers
(1978), written and directed by James Toback and starring Harvey Keitel. An
added bonus was the appearance of Toback after the screening, who was welcomed
onto the stage for a Q&A with noted French film critic Michel Ciment, the
editor of the film journal Positif
and one of the lone champions of the controversial film when it opened in
theaters 31 years ago. (The twin heavyweights of film criticism at the time,
Janet Maslin and Vincent Canby, both “piled on,†as Toback put it, with
negative reviews that killed its box office word-of-mouth.)
Keitel plays Jimmy “Fingers†Angelelli, a virtuoso
pianist who aspires to a life on the concert stage, rather than his day job of
being a kneecap-breaker for his loan shark father (Michael Gazzo). When the
movie begins he’s practicing a Bach toccata for a make-it-or-break-it audition
with the head of Carnegie Hall. If he makes it, it could be his long-awaited
exit out of a life of shaking down pizzeria owners for ten grand. In between
practice sessions he’s driving a flashy red Cadillac convertible around town,
wearing Botany 500 suits and a rakish scarf, and blaring ‘50s pop from his
portable boombox. This is one dude who is a study in contradictions. Keitel interprets
Jimmy so sympathetically -- the most obvious character tic being his fidgety
hands that cannot be governed, hence his nickname – that you can’t help falling
under his charm within the first few minutes of the movie.
Meanwhile, his father has one client that not only
is refusing to pay up, but is mocking him behind his back: Riccamonza, a
handsome, up-and-coming Mafioso. Jimmy’s father needs Riccamonza to be humbled
– perhaps worse – to regain his respect, and he turns to his son as his only
hope.
Adding to his stress load, Jimmy is crazy about an
enigmatic girl (Tisa Farrow) who barely says a word, stares into space a lot
and lives in a loft in Soho. (This was 1978, keep in mind.) It turns out she’s
a prostitute working for a pimp played by Jim Brown – yes, that Jim Brown – the NFL Hall of Famer and ‘70s blaxploitation star.
His role as “Dreems†is only one of a number of flavorful cameos in this
strange, nervous, colorful and frenetic little picture.
The cinematographer, Michael Chapman, who also
lensed Taxi Driver for Scorsese,
gives Fingers a similar look: dark,
gritty, but splashed with rich, violent color.Â
A number of gem-like cameos are studded throughout:
Stage actress Marian Seldes as Jimmy’s asylum-dwelling mother; Danny Aiello as
one half of the two-member bodyguard detail surrounding arch-villain
Riccamonza, the other half being Ed Marinaro; Tanya Roberts, in a bikini which slips
off easily, as Riccamonza’s girlfriend; Lenny Montana (The Godfather) as the pizzeria owner (filmed at John’s Pizzeria on
Bleecker Street), and – are you ready for this? – GOP fundraiser heavy
Georgette Mosbacher as Jimmy’s father’s cheap and tawdry girlfriend, Anita.
(Checking it out, it makes sense, she was then married to the producer, George
Barrie.)
Toback had many a hilarious anecdote to tell host
Ciment about the making of the film, his first directorial effort, and perhaps
most memorable was concerning the shocking scene in which Dreems (Jim Brown)
knocks together the heads of his two call girls, one of whom was Tisa Farrow.
As Toback remembers, he approached Brown after the first, all-too-real take
that left Farrow with real blood dribbling down her knotted forehead. Toback
told Brown that they wouldn’t be doing another take, it was simply too painful
for the actresses. Brown appeared to not be listening. “He was staring off into
space, not even reacting,†said Toback. Finally Brown, in a voice barely above
a whisper and in language that is unprintable, asked Toback why he hadn’t hired
a more “delicate†actor like Sidney Poiter to do the scene so they could fake
the head-butting. Farrow complained (and in today’s litigious environment who
knows what an actress would have done) and later, as penance, Toback smacked
himself on the head repeatedly with the butt of a pistol during the sound
recording in post-production. He, too, had blood pouring down his face, but he
didn’t want to ask his actors to suffer something he himself wasn’t willing to
endure. “So whenever you’re going through the sound catalogue of heads being
butted together,†Toback told the audience, “that is me hitting my head with
the butt of a pistol.â€
Another anecdote involved Francois Truffaut, who,
during the year of its release, named it as one of his favorite from an
American director in years. Shortly afterwards while at The Beverly Hills
Hotel, Toback spotted the famous French auteur
poolside, who was in town during the making of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Instead of approaching him
directly to thank him and risk putting Truffaut on the spot, opted to page him
on a house telephone, as was the fashion of the day. When he picked up the
phone – Toback watching from inside the hotel – he graciously thanked Truffaut
for his support, only to be met with a long silence. Getting flustered, he
suggested that he would love to meet Truffaut for a drink while he was in town.
“I don’t think that would be a good idea,†replied Truffaut. “Why is that?â€
asked Toback. “I think we should just continue communicating to each other
through our films.â€